It was already night.
The car was parked on the roadside. No infected in any direction, the plain doing its quiet thing, the specific stillness that meant nothing had picked up our scent yet.
I had told them everything.
Jenn was on the bonnet, sitting with her legs hanging, processing it the way she had decided to process it, which was outside and alone and in the dark. I wasn't going to change that. Grief has its own geography and you don't reroute it.
Mercury was inside the car.
She had known Major for less than an hour. That didn't seem to matter. Some people connect fast and feel it fully and don't apologize for the math not making sense. That was Mercury. I was learning her.
I walked back to the car and stopped at the bonnet.
"Hey," I said.
